Confederate Money. Paul Varnes
with them taking his things at the river, Henry wrote the story three times. The writing took a full hour.
During the writing the woman quit sniveling and began to come on to us. She wanted fifty cents to go in the back room. Henry wasn’t having any of it. To tell the truth she began to look good to me, and I started thinking about it, but I didn’t have fifty cents.
Henry took some things from the pack on the mule and showed them to Sam. Sam believed the story after seeing the books with Henry’s name in them and the clothes, which fit him.
We left one paper with Sam, along with instructions that he was to fetch the sheriff before cleaning up the place and was to give the sheriff the paper. Henry also explained to Sam that he better do it right or, when we came back through the area, we would stuff his body in a gator hole.
Ma was awake and reading the Bible when we came riding in near midnight. Lilly was also awake. Having eyes only for Henry, I don’t think Lilly was aware of me walking in the door.
I told the story, but didn’t tell about the woman. Though it was in the paper Henry had written, and Ma would know, Lilly didn’t need to know at the time. Ma then said a prayer. She didn’t beat it to death. She just said a few words of thanks for us being safe. We all held hands while Ma said the words. Lilly held on to Henry’s hands a few seconds longer than to mine. Ma pretended not to notice. I didn’t care what either of them did, Henry was my man and I was already planning on going to Pensacola.
We heard later that Bud died from infection in his jaw a few days after the set-to. His jaw was so broken up, and he was so addled, that he never said another word after Henry hit him with the rifle butt. It was also said that the sheriff was satisfied with what Sam and the woman told him. He never even came to talk to us.
A second copy of Henry’s paper was left with Ma, along with the Bar-S mare and the extra guns we didn’t need. No one ever claimed the guns or the horses. Ma inquired and found out that Bud had actually traded legal for the Bar-S mare. Lilly’s still riding that mare. No record was ever found of the other horses.
Ma talked Henry into staying and resting for several days before we left for Pensacola. I don’t know what he was resting from. He looked rested enough to me by late the next morning when we both finally got up.
Lilly persuaded Henry to teach her something about riding every day while we were still at the house. Though they were never gone for more than a couple of hours on any day, Lilly quickly became a very confident rider. Henry and I also talked about the stuff in Henry’s medical book every day. He was proud of that book.
For those few days I mostly sat in front of the house and cleaned our weapons and saddles, and waited for the right time to announce that I was going to Pensacola. I also started reading that medical book of Henry’s. Being a slower reader than Henry, I had to read twice as long as him and had to ask him how to say some words. It turned out that some of the words were just the names of joints, parts, or muscles of animals or people. They’re all about the same. Having cut up lots of hogs and deer, I knew those parts. Anatomy was simple once you knew how to say the words. Ma encouraged me to sit and read.
One thing of note happened that made all of them feel I would be safe going off with Henry. Ma had a hen that hatched off some chicks. A big red hawk soon started hanging around and stealing one of those chicks every day or two. As most women do, Ma keeps a snuff can full of arsenic for just such an occasion. When one of the chicks died, she stuffed some arsenic up its rectum and laid it on a horse pen post. Within an hour the hawk swooped in and snatched that chick off the post. Having reloaded his .45 caliber Hawken, which I had just cleaned, Henry was standing at the corner of the house and saw the hawk. Not knowing Ma had poisoned the chick to kill the hawk, he threw up and shot the hawk going away at sixty yards. He killed it dead as a stump. Even though I had to clean the rifle again, I was smiling about that shot.
October 28, 1861
After getting out of bed and eating early, we hung around for what seemed like hours before leaving that morning for Pensacola. Ma and the kids went out and looked for eggs in the various places that hens would hide their nests while Lilly and Henry washed the dishes. I think Ma was just leaving Lilly and Henry alone. I saddled the horses and got the mule loaded. When we were leaving Lilly walked over to the left side of Henry’s horse and said something to him that I couldn’t quite make out. Reaching down with his left arm, Henry lifted her against him and kissed her. He was as strong as a mule.
I expected at any minute that Ma was going to tell me I couldn’t go but she never did. Touching our heels to our horses, we loped off until screened by the woods. We then slowed to a steady walk toward Pensacola. As we rode, I began to understand why they hadn’t made a fuss about me going. I was the insurance that Henry would come back. Lilly had set her bonnet for him.
Two days before reaching Tallahassee we were joined by six women and nine children who were also on their way to Tallahassee. Their men off to war, and concerned about Federal forces raiding the coast, the women were seeking a safe inland haven to sit out the war. They thought the war would be over in a few weeks and they could go back home. Thinking their plight temporary, the women were lighthearted and fun to be around. Since they were not carrying much in the way of food, we wound up feeding them for a couple of days. Those were the first refugees we encountered. I frequently thought of them later when seeing other refugees who were not so lighthearted.
Another thing of note happened as we skirted Tallahassee to avoid encountering the Confederate troops garrisoned there. The night after parting company with the group of women, we ran into a drummer and camped overnight with him. The drummer had an old medical bag in his wagon.
Henry didn’t say anything about the bag that night but the next morning he said to the drummer, “I’ve got a friend in Cedar Key that’s a physician. Do you mind if I look at the bag?”
Of course the drummer didn’t mind and Henry looked in it. There were all kinds of instruments in the bag. There was also a half-pint bottle of laudanum and a small bottle of chloroform concealed under a false bottom.
“How long have you had this bag?” Henry asked.
“Several weeks,” the drummer said.
“How much did it set you back?”
“Three dollars.”
“Confederate paper I hope. It’s not worth more than two dollars in silver or Florida paper money.”
The drummer laughed and said, “It was Confederate paper.”
Henry said, “I’ve only got two dollars and forty cents in silver coin, but I can’t leave us broke. I’ll give you two silver dollars for the bag and contents.”
There aren’t many buyers for old medical bags so the drummer said, “Make it the two dollars and forty in silver and it’s a deal.”
Henry said, “I can’t do it. That would leave us flat broke. I’ll make it two dollars and twenty-five cents, and that’s it.”
That’s when we really got into the physician business. I guess Henry momentarily forgot about the other four dollars in his pocket.
A Confederate paper dollar was worth ninety cents in silver or Florida paper money at the time. As is well known now, Confederate money was printed with nothing to back it up but the good will of the Confederate government. It was to be redeemed two years after the Confederate states signed a treaty of peace with the United States of America. The Federal government declared a dollar per barrel tax on beer to help finance the war for the North. The Confederate government borrowed from the Southern states and printed money to finance their side. Though we couldn’t have known it at the time, there was never a real plan for how to pay the states back, or how to finance the redeeming of the Confederate paper money.
When Florida seceded from the Union, the Florida government confiscated all Federal land in Florida. The state then printed Florida paper money against